ProMedica’s Board of Trustees’ recent decision to enter into a transfer agreement with Capital Care Network, Toledo’s last remaining abortion facility, defies logic. The hospital states that entering into this agreement aligns with their mission and values in the belief that “no one is beyond the reach of life-saving health care.” But in fact, because their partnering with the abortion clinic facilitates the denial of “life-saving health care” for the most vulnerable, unborn babies, their very decision defies logic. To say, as Toledo Blade editor Keith Burris has, that on the one hand no one could deny as a matter of science that abortion is the taking of a baby’s life, and on the other hand that ProMedica’s decision is “a gutsy, pro-life act of leadership,” also defies logic.

Logic is the science of good or valid reasoning, a reasoning based on wisdom and common sense. To say that a health care system’s mission is to improve the health and well-being of its patients is logical. To say that its mission includes partnering with a clinic whose reason for existence is the direct killing and dismemberment of innocent human life, is simply illogical. To say that abortion is health care defies logic. It makes no sense.

It’s logical for people of good will, no matter their religion, to expect that anyone, in particular a pregnant mother experiencing a medical emergency, should be able to receive lifesaving treatment at a hospital. It is not logical for people, no matter their religion, to expect or insist that in order to provide care for a woman in a health crisis, a respected hospital should partner with a clinic whose aim is life destroying “treatment.” In fact, ProMedica rightly would have treated any woman coming to their emergency room doors in need or in crisis, without a “transfer agreement”.

The reasoning that a hospital’s task is to “save every life you can” is perfectly logical. But the reasoning that a hospital should enter into an agreement in order to address the sad possibility of treating the rare patient who might be transferred from Capital Care, versus the sadder reality of the hundreds of innocent babies whose lives will be snuffed out each year in that clinic as a direct result of the agreement, is perfectly illogical. It makes no sense.

That good, dedicated and competent doctors, nurses, staff and volunteers of a hospital daily pour themselves out to heal and save life is more than logical, it’s commendable. That members of the board of trustees of a hospital, whose doors are open to heal and save life, would unilaterally make a decision which keeps open the doors of a clinic that destroys and terminates life, is more than illogical, it’s deplorable. There is simply no getting around it: the decision of ProMedica’s Board of Trustees to sign the transfer agreement means that unborn babies will continue to be slaughtered in Toledo at Capital Care.

Logic is all about sound reasoning. As a health care system, ProMedica’s decision to partner to keep open a clinic whose purpose is the opposite of health care, is an example of flawed logic. That decision does not reflect the purpose and mission of a hospital, to heal and sustain human life. That decision instead facilitates the very destruction of the weakest of our human family, the unborn in the womb. I invite all people of good will, who understand and value logic and life, to join me in petitioning the members of the ProMedica Board to overturn their hasty decision and to renew their commitment to the logic and life worthy of their health care system.

As Pope Francis states: “In all its phases and at every age, human life is always sacred and always of quality. And not as a matter of faith, but of reason and science.” This is the logic of life.

Cardinal Gerhard Müller spoke at Rome’s Lateran University on the infallibility of the Church’s ban on artificial birth control taught in Humanae Vitae: “[M]aterially it is infallible, because it belongs to Christian anthropology and revealed anthropology and natural anthropology.” Church Militant website has article.

Posted by Catholic Voter on Tuesday, Mar, 13, 2018 3:17 PM (EDT):

Fantastic article, Bishop!!

God bless you.

Posted by James korenek on Tuesday, Mar, 13, 2018 2:28 PM (EDT):

This is very wrong. Abortion is taking a life. This is totally wrong and not healthcare. Only exception ifmother’slife is indanger than the parents need to ask God for the answer,not the healthcare system.

Posted by cthlc12345 on Monday, Mar, 12, 2018 12:07 PM (EDT):

I’ve always thought the term “women’s healthcare” was an odd way to describe abortion. Notice that the left always has a problem with science, like when life begins, or with gender.
As Pope Benedict warned, moral relativism is one of the biggest dangers.

Posted by Wendy Gardner on Monday, Mar, 12, 2018 12:04 PM (EDT):

“He hoped the forthcoming U.S. bishops’ concrete pastoral plan to implement Amoris Laetitia at the local level would fill that need and make clear at the outset how divorced and separated persons are welcomed in the Catholic Church.”
This quote is from another article, about Amoris Laetitia published today as well. I wanted to ask what the problem was between divorced and separated persons and the Church if such people weren’t remarried, but I couldn’t because they said the time allowed to comment on that article had expired!! I never saw that before. What’s up, Register?

Posted by Kurt on Monday, Mar, 12, 2018 12:02 PM (EDT):

I am so happy that this bishop is willing to do what too many in the RTL establishment will not do—criticize private enterprise for their direct involvement in abortion. Contrary to the political games played by RTL bureaucrats, a baby is not “less dead” when killed by private enterprise.

Posted by Donald Link on Monday, Mar, 12, 2018 11:26 AM (EDT):

I echo the praise of Bishop Thomas. He seems one of the few of our Ordinaries willing to forcefully speak out against this hypocritical evil of our time. May his tribe increase.

Posted by smk, ofs on Monday, Mar, 12, 2018 9:43 AM (EDT):

We in the Cleveland Diocese were very blessed to be under the care of Bishop Thomas, in addition to all his responsibilities with the good people of the Toledo Diocese, after the retirement of Bishop Lennon until Bishop Perez became our new bishop. Reading this, you can see why. He is a good, faithful, holy pastor who speaks the truth of the Gospel, and is no doubt very pleasing to God.

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